How Often Should You Really Change Your Oil?

For many years, car owners who have taken advantage of Houston auto glass repair have also dutifully ensured that their oil was changed every 3,000 miles. This was the general recommendation for quite some time and was a valid guideline for vehicles built in the 1970s and earlier. However, many believe that this is still the case today, and this myth has been propagated by many people, especially those responsible for changing your oil as they want to see you as often as possible.

Your vehicle will likely be able to go between 7,500 to 10,000 miles between oil changes. The mileage necessary from one oil change to another for almost all 2013 cars exceeds 5,000 miles with the lone exceptions being a small number of the vehicles that were manufactured by Toyota, Kia and Hyundai that year. Impressively, all Jaguars being made today can go 15,000 miles before another oil change is necessary.

Make sure to read your owner’s manual to see how long you should drive your car before getting an oil change. Or you can use a convenient tool that CalRecycle has on its website: www.calrecycle.ca.gov/UsedOil/OilChange/FindInterval/. As long as your car is from 2000-14, you can simply enter the details for it there and receive information related to how soon you should change its oil.

The type of driving that you generally do has an impact as well. For example, those engaged in a lot of stop-and-go driving, short trips or traversing over rough roads or in significantly cold, hot or humid conditions will need to get their oil changed more often others. Of course, those who have taken advantage of Houston mobile auto glass repair know all about driving in the hot, sticky conditions that this area is known for and should account for regularly putting their cars through those experiences.

What damage are you causing by changing your oil too often? As far as your car goes, you are not causing any damage. However, you are wasting quite a bit of oil, which is not good for the environment or your pocketbook.

Unnecessarily changed motor oil has become a significant problem. For example, this insoluble product and its toxic chemicals and heavy metals regularly end up in a variety of bodies of water such as lakes, rivers and oceans. In fact, 1 million gallons of water can be fouled by a single gallon of used motor oil. Of course, there will always be used motor oil, but the less of it that is out there the better.

Also, getting oil changes more often than you need to is like repeatedly throwing out a perfectly good gallon container of milk in order to buy a new one, an act that wastes valuable resources and unnecessarily hits to your pocketbook. This money could instead be set aside for more important tasks like Houston windshield replacement.

Fortunately, more cars being manufactured nowadays take all of the guesswork out of the equation as they have oil-life monitors. These monitor how quickly oil is being used as a result of conditions such as how many miles have been driven, what type of driving is usually undertaken and how long it has been since an oil change was last performed.

Of course, the quality and robustness of the oil being used also plays a significant factor in the longevity of its use. In fact, Mobil 1 Extended Performance “provides protection for up to 15,000 miles between oil changes.”

So, there may be some variety in regards to how often you should change your oil as compared to others you know, but one thing is clear: it is going to be less often than once every 3,000 miles and has been for quite some time.